Thinkobot
New Member
Hi all,
I'm writing a piece about the origins of poker chips, and I keep coming across the factoid that wild west and Gold Rush saloons originally accepted bets made directly with money as well as items with monetary value, like gold nuggets or gold dust or even firearms, but eventually switched to making people buy ivory poker chips, then cheaper clay ones, and then custom chips with inlays, and so on, slowly finding ways to make counterfeiting chips harder and harder, eventually leading to the ceramic and stamped clay composite chips we are all familiar with today.
But I'm finding it difficult to find any source material that expands on where and how the changeover from accepting bets of money and valuables to using the earliest chips actually took place. It's not like all the saloon and riverboat managers were going to conventions and reading trade journals and coordinating their game-running strategies. Someone somewhere had to have made that decision first, whereupon it spread and became more popular as a solution to the problem of standardization of betting . Any chance any collectors here can point me to any literature or other sources that might expand on that initial transition?
I can find literature from the 1850s that talks about people betting gold, and literature from the 1880s that talk about people betting with chips, but nothing that clears up the transition. Was it related to the existence of privately owned poker chip sets in any way? Any guidance or leads anyone could provide would be very much appreciated. Thanks a lot, and I apologize if this question is too off-topic!
I'm writing a piece about the origins of poker chips, and I keep coming across the factoid that wild west and Gold Rush saloons originally accepted bets made directly with money as well as items with monetary value, like gold nuggets or gold dust or even firearms, but eventually switched to making people buy ivory poker chips, then cheaper clay ones, and then custom chips with inlays, and so on, slowly finding ways to make counterfeiting chips harder and harder, eventually leading to the ceramic and stamped clay composite chips we are all familiar with today.
But I'm finding it difficult to find any source material that expands on where and how the changeover from accepting bets of money and valuables to using the earliest chips actually took place. It's not like all the saloon and riverboat managers were going to conventions and reading trade journals and coordinating their game-running strategies. Someone somewhere had to have made that decision first, whereupon it spread and became more popular as a solution to the problem of standardization of betting . Any chance any collectors here can point me to any literature or other sources that might expand on that initial transition?
I can find literature from the 1850s that talks about people betting gold, and literature from the 1880s that talk about people betting with chips, but nothing that clears up the transition. Was it related to the existence of privately owned poker chip sets in any way? Any guidance or leads anyone could provide would be very much appreciated. Thanks a lot, and I apologize if this question is too off-topic!